Thursday, July 2, 2009

Lunch Special at Two Small Rooms

Two Small Roomshttp://www.twosmallrooms.com/

Two Small Rooms describes itself as 'boutique fine dining'. If you have no idea what that means, just walk in and it'll click. As soon as I stepped inside, it was like walking into someone's house. The dining area is literally - two small, side-by-side rooms. I was reminded of Bill's in Sydney since that place also has the 'home' vibe going.

Apparently, the people behind Two Small Rooms are also responsible for Restaurant II and Three Bistro (they clearly like their single digit numerals). I've had a degustation at Restaurant II before and it was quite a meal - perhaps my most 'fine' fine dining experience to date. Consequently, I went into Two Small Rooms with high expectations.We booked for a Friday Lunch with the intention of getting the lunch special. I'm not sure how long the lunch special will go for but it's a fabulous deal: 2 courses + beverage of choice for $30pp.

Walking up to Two Small Rooms, Charlie and I were very skeptical about the location. Milton Rd is busy and thunderously noisy at the best of times. However, when we were seated inside, it was lovely and quiet even though our table was right beside the window. They must have fantastic soundproof technology.

The lunch special menu has 2 entrees, 3 mains and 2 desserts to chose from - you can select any 2 courses. I think this menu changes quite frequently too. Charlie chose an entree and main and I went for main plus dessert.

Beverages

For drinks, I continued on with my goal of learning how to enjoy wine with my meal by ordering the house white wine. Charlie had a soft drink.

Complimentary bread and butter

We spent some time scanning the menu for bread because for some reason (possibly because we'd just had coffee at the French Patisserie around the corner), we were in the mood for bread. After asking the waiter, we learnt that house bread and butter was a complimentary appetizer. Awesome. The bread was great too - soft, chewy and dense.

Escargot with salsa verde

The entree of escargots came out not too long after. I've had escargot once before at Belle Epoche at the Emporium and was unimpressed. This was a lot better - the accompanying salsa was fresh and tangy and complimented the meat really well.

Swiss brown mushroom linguine

Charlie's main was Swiss mushroom linguine. The serving is a bit on the small side and the pasta is very simple but he liked it. This wasn't a sauce-laden pasta but the ingredients shone through.

Toulouse cassoulet with chantrelles

My main was the pork sausage casserole. The sausages were served in a bed of tomato and beans which were very flavorsome. The dish was nice but very home-style. I think it was quite a healthy choice though.

Pear and apple crumble with vanilla bean ice cream

The dessert was a fruit crumble with ice cream on the side. I liked the crumble topping but didn't eat the fruit by itself because it's just not my thing. The ice cream was lovely.

Two Small Rooms had a fantastic atmosphere - relaxed, homely yet refined. The service was great too; I thought our waiter was extremely friendly. I wasn't overly impressed with the food we had. Everything was reasonably tasty and there weren't any horrors but I expected a lot more. Maybe the a la carte menu choices are more indicative of the standards of their cooking... I won't know till I try that.

Sorry but what do you mean by your comment? Do you mean that the bread is not complimentary anymore? Or that everyone has to pay a cover charge? My review (the one you read) was from July 2009 so it's probably out of date.